


What I Did on My Christmas Holiday

by drayton



Category: Oxford Time Travel Universe - Connie Willis
Genre: Gen, Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-11
Updated: 2015-06-11
Packaged: 2018-04-14 22:50:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,293
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4583127
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/drayton/pseuds/drayton
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For Colin, traveling to the fourteenth century is easier than telling people he's done it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What I Did on My Christmas Holiday

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lirin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lirin/gifts).



“Mum, I want to be an historian,” I said, as soon as I got off the Tube in London.

“That's lovely, dear,” she replied, absently dropping a kiss somewhere in the vicinity of my left cheek.

“No, really, Mum...” I said, but she was already hurrying away to claim a taxi. Things didn't go any better in the taxi. I kept talking about Dunworthy and Kivrin and going to the Crusades some day, and she kept talking about the detestable Eric and how I'd need to leave for boarding school in the morning.

After a while, I gave it up as a bad job. Clearly, her holiday with Eric's relatives hadn't gone well, and Mum never listens when she's obsessing over a livein. I decided to try her again after she'd worked out whether or not she could salvage her relationship with Eric, or even wanted to.

 

School was the same as ever. The good thing about boarding school is that many of the adults actually listen when you tell them things. The bad thing is that some of them only do it because they're paid to. Mr. Denison is one of those, and I wasn't surprised when he told us to write an essay about our holiday. Denison asks for this essay two or three times a year. I suspect he files them away and uses the tidbits to make it appear he's been listening when students tell him about their lives and families.

I usually don't object to writing this essay—well, not any more than I object to writing essays in general—but this time, I felt a curious reluctance to begin. As eager as I'd been to tell Mum about everything, I didn't want to commit any of those thoughts to paper. Somehow, I felt that would make Dunworthy and Kivrin a part of my past, and I didn't want them to be over.

Denison noticed my inactivity. “Well, Templer? Deciding which vid to tell us about first?”

Most of the class giggled, so I put my head down and got to work. I wrote about how I'd slipped through the quarantine perimeter, and about the curious mixture of annoyance, fear, and excitement I'd witnessed on the streets of Oxford in the early days of the epidemic. I gave several useful tips about how to evade nurses, and the best places to post flyers. I wrote about how awful the carillon sounded and the peculiar habits of bell ringers. I even wrote about the shortages and the ghastly porridge and Mrs. Gaddson, but I couldn't bring myself to write about what it was like the day Great-aunt Mary died, when no one would tell me anything and I thought Mr. Dunworthy was dying just down the hall. I wrote about the triumphant excitement I'd felt when sneaking Badri and Dunworthy out of the hospital, but not about the way my insides flipped over when Dunworthy said, “You're my responsibility.” I wrote about the bodies I'd seen, but not about how it felt to see so many unburied corpses lying abandoned in the snow, or the shock I'd felt when I realised the person I'd mistaken for another dead contemp was actually the historian we'd been searching for. I wrote about the cold, endless ride back to the drop but not about Dunworthy telling me I'd make a fine historian one day, that last morning in Oxford.

I told Denison nearly everything I'd seen and done and almost nothing of what I'd felt, and he believed none of it.

“Do it again,” he told me the next morning. “This was supposed to be a _descriptive_ essay, Templer, not a work of fiction.”

“It's not fiction,” I protested.

“Really, Templer... you were in Oxford during the epidemic? Your aunt died while spearheading the response?”

“Great-aunt,” I corrected. The boys around me were shifting uneasily in their seats. Denison has a mean streak when he thinks he's being crossed, and as much as oafs like Warren and Hurley might enjoy seeing me tormented, they didn't want to draw attention to themselves, for fear of becoming Denison's next target.

“You traveled to the Black Death with an Oxford don, to rescue an historian?”

“Yes,” I said firmly, wondering if Denison were this surly to his fellow teachers and whether or not they liked him.

He leaned over until his face was only a few inches away from mine, and hissed, “Your mother would have told us if such a thing had happened.”

“The only thing on Mum's mind these days is her livein. Ask Mr. Dunworthy. Ask Kivrin. I was there and it happened. I'm not going to write something else that's nothing but lies, just to please you.”

Denison scrawled something on the back of my essay, thrust it at me, and said, “The headmaster's office, Templer. I'm sure you know the way.”

 

“Let me guess: you've been provoking Mr. Denison again,” Headmaster Patil said with a knowing smile, as soon as he laid eyes on me.

“No, sir,” I said, “although perhaps that's what he thinks. I'm supposed to give you this.” I handed him my essay.

“Sit,” he said. He frowned as he read Denison's angry note. After reading the essay itself, he quietly said, “I'll look into this. Return to class. And pretend an attitude of respect if you have it not.” As I turned to go, he said, “Templer? I'm sorry about your great-aunt.”

Well, at least he believed the bit about Great-aunt Mary, but nothing would be done about Denison. No surprise there. With a sigh, I reminded myself that all of the other teachers were quite decent, and I only had to put up with Denison for two more terms.

 

I should have guessed it wouldn't end there. Warren and Hurley came up to me at the break.

“Oh! Oh! I've got the Black Death,” Hurley said, falling down while clutching at his chest.

“Makes for a nice change from the brain death,” I said. “They called it the blue sickness, idiot.”

I was turning to go when Warren grabbed me roughly from behind. I pushed him away, and he shoved back. Hurley grabbed me and punched me in the face, and I punched back without thinking about it.

“Boys!” Mr. Lassiter called, running up to us. He pulled Warren away as he made a lunge for me. I stepped back and saw that a clump of boys and teachers was gathering around us.

Denison sneered at me. “Twice in one day, Templer. That might be a record, even for you.”

 

If Denison had expected the headmaster to be enraged by my sudden reappearance, he'd miscalculated, as Warren and Hurley's thuggish tendencies were well-known to the staff. Not that my mother was pleased to receive a call from the headmaster. By the following evening, she'd left me an angry vid message. It seemed unfair that the phone system which had been so unreliable during the epidemic should be working perfectly now.

Mum's not very coherent when she's flakked, but in her message she seemed to be worried that my behavior would affect my acceptance to Eton. She told me she'd decided to pull me from summer boarding school and engage private tutors “at considerable expense.” _Just great, Mum,_ I thought. _You couldn't be bothered to listen to me, but one phone call from the headmaster and you've decided I'm a delinquent_. I groaned, as the boarding school I usually attend during the summer months is quite fun. I found myself hoping the “tutors” weren't escapees from a Dickens novel. My last private tutor had been absolutely necrotic.

 

The next day, we were enduring another lesson with Denison when Headmaster Patil stuck his head in the door, and said, “A word with you, Mr. Denison.”

“Can't it wait? I've got a lesson.”

“I've brought along a guest speaker.” As ever, Patil's manner was deceptively mild, but it was clear he meant to be obeyed. Denison conceded with poor grace, as Patil opened the door fully and ushered in our guest.

It was Kivrin. She'd finally cut her hair to be all one length and had more colour in her cheeks than the last time I'd seen her. I was surprised Dunworthy had let her leave Oxford on her own, as he'd been very solicitous of her well-being since our return. Amusing, really, considering her physical health had been much better than his.

“This is Miss Engle, a graduate student at Oxford. I expect your courteous attention,” Patil said, and gave us a warning look as he left with Denison.

“Hullo,” Kivrin said, walking to the front of the room. “As your headmaster said, I'm Kivrin Engle. I'm an historian and I've just returned from the fourteenth century. Christmas of 1348, to be precise.”

“The Black Death,” the boy next to me said in awe.

“Actually, it was called the blue sickness, as Mr. Templer could likely tell you. He was there, too.”

Everyone turned to stare at me. It took everything I had not to make a face at Hurley and Warren. As much as I wanted to gloat, I decided it wouldn't be worth the conflict that would inevitably follow. Patil wouldn't be pleased if I turned up in his office again for fighting. Mercifully, one of the other boys asked Kivrin a question and my moment of temptation passed.

Question followed question as Kivrin told my class not just about the plague, but also about what ordinary medieval life had been like, and all the work historians do to prepare for drops. “So, you see,” she said, “as tedious as you may feel reading Latin is just now, there are several centuries in the past where that knowledge could be put to good use.” She looked straight at me, and I ducked my head, wishing I'd worked a bit harder at my Latin.

The bell rang and several of the boys thanked Kivrin for coming. As I was packing up to go, I said, “Nicely done. They liked it, Kiv, and not just because they missed an hour of Denison.”

She smiled. “High praise, indeed, but where are you off to in such a rush?”

“I have another lesson...”

“You're excused, as you have a visitor. Come along.”

We left the building and strolled across the yard where the boys take morning break. “Thank you for coming,” I said.

She turned abruptly to face me. “Why didn't you contact us?”

I shrugged. “I didn't think it mattered.”

“Of course it matters. Did you think Dunworthy wouldn't come charging down here to put that lout in his place?”

 _Mum wouldn't_ , I thought. “But,” I said, looking around at a conspicuous lack of Dunworthy.

“He's chatting up the headmaster and Denison. Explaining things. Your mother didn't seem to know anything about it when he spoke to her.”

“I tried telling her, but Mum doesn't listen.”

“She does sometimes,” Kivrin said, looking amused.

“What?”

“She didn't get the bit about you jumping into the net with Dunworthy—you did tell her, didn't you?”

I nodded.

“Hmm. She didn't get that part, but you managed to convince her that you're serious about becoming an historian. That's why you aren't going to boarding school this summer.”

“How did you... _you're_ the private tutors?”

“Dunworthy, myself, and perhaps a stray lesson here and there from someone else. You'll be spending this summer in Oxford. Perhaps a lot of summers in Oxford, if your mum's agreeable.”

I thought excitedly, _Dunworthy wants me to stay for the summer_ , and then realised, _because Mum is paying him a lot of money_. I scarcely knew Dunworthy, but somehow the idea that he was being paid to spend time with me hurt.

“Colin? What's wrong? I thought you'd be happy about... oh! Is it the money?”

I nodded reluctantly, feeling embarrassed.

“Oh, Colin," she said, with a sympathetic frown. "Dunworthy would have taken you in for nothing, but Finch and I persuaded him we should charge a fee. Otherwise, your mum might think we're planning to sell you into slavery or something. We'll need to pay for your riding lessons and such, but most of the money will be set aside to cover your expenses at university.”

“You're sure he actually wants me to come?”

“Quite sure,” said a dry voice behind me. I turned to see Dunworthy giving me a look somewhere between amusement and reproof.

“Denison sorted?” Kivrin asked.

“Thoroughly,” he said with grim satisfaction, and then turned to me. “Which leaves only you. You've been back at school less than a week and I'm getting calls from the headmaster. Is this a portent of things to come?”

“It depends,” I said. “Did you promise Mum you'd make me an historian, or did you promise her you'd make me behave?”

Dunworthy struggled to suppress a smile. “The former,” he said.

“Well, then,” I said. “Tell Finch to expect a lot of calls from headmasters.”

Dunworthy placed a hand on the back of my neck and gave me a stern look. “Perhaps we should discuss whether that would, in fact, be in your best interest. And we should definitely address your troubling propensity for violence.”

“I didn't start it!” I said, then saw the corners of his mouth quirking up, and realised he'd been teasing me. “Thanks for calling Mum about this summer,” I said, looking down at my feet.

“Actually, she contacted us,” Dunworthy said, releasing me with a pat. “We were going to wait another week or two, until we had a lesson plan sorted out. Let me tell you what we have so far.”

As Dunworthy described his summer plans for me, I thought, _Wow, Mum. You got this one right. Thanks._

  
  



End file.
